When Tiago let go of the chambermaid she collapsed to the floor again, wheezing, but at least she was breathing, and thus her condition had improved substantially.

The same could not be said of Tiago’s situation. When the glass was freed, so were the two men from their paralysis.

They launched their attack without conferring. Without uttering a word. The men worked in sync like a well-honed team, which is what they probably were. While the worker leaped at him over Shahla, the officer dived headlong across the bed.

Tiago would not have been able to say who hit him first. Or which punch ensured that he yanked the television with him as he fell to the ground. This is it, was the thought that entered his head as he saw the fist hovering above his face. He was expecting to hear his teeth crunch and feel his jawbone shatter. But nothing of the sort happened. Instead, the fist vanished from his sight and he heard a woman’s muffled voice call out from a distance, and in German, ‘Lisa, are you there?’

He hurriedly pushed the television set away from his aching upper body and scrambled to his feet.

‘Go!’ he heard Shahla say. She was still unable to stand herself. Blood was running down her chin, her eyes were flooded with tears, but the skin on her face wasn’t so blue any more.

She looked at the connecting door, which had closed again from the movement of the ship. The knob turned slowly.

‘May I come in, Lisa?’ the woman behind the door asked, knocking. Tiago had only a few seconds to copy the crew members and make himself scarce.

He leaped over Shahla’s head to the door, which after the men’s escape was about to close again, wrenched it open, dived into the corridor and didn’t turn back to the voice coming from behind him. It was Lisa’s mother, yelling after him, ‘Stop! Stay where you are!’

He darted left down the short, empty section of the corridor, turned into the nearest stairwell and, without thinking about it, ran up six flights till he got to deck 11, where he dashed outside, bursting into a group of laughing holidaymakers who’d formed a semicircle for a group photo.

‘Sorry,’ he mumbled to the overweight man holding the camera, and looked around. It was just after half past nine, and most passengers were still busy with the breakfast buffets or looking on deck 15 for a place in the sun, which today was struggling to break through the cloud cover.

In front of him a steward was cleaning the planks; behind him the wall beneath the chimney was being repainted. No sign of the two madmen. Or of the mother. Yet his pulse refused to calm down.

What on earth did I get into there? he wondered.